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Come full circle from Stonewall

On March 27,
1991, Edwin C (Toby)
Johnson and Clifton D (Kip) Dollar, along with Danalynn Recer and
Pamela Voekel, appeared at the Travis County Courthouse to apply for
marriage licenses as part of a political action organized the Texas
Lesbian/Gay Rights Lobby (now Equality Texas). They were, of course,
reluctantly turned down in an event widely covered in the news,
including CBS National News. County Clerk Dana DeBeauvoir took the
occasion to make a public declaration of support for legislation then
being sponsored in the Texas Legislature by Rep. Debra Danburg,
D-Houston, to delete references to gender in the state’s marriage laws.
Dana DeBeauvoir made a wonderful speech in support of gay relationship
recognition.

Johnson and Dollar ran Liberty Books, the lesbian/gay community
bookstore in Austin, at the time and were a well known couple in the
community. Two years later on October 11, 1993, they again went before
Ms. DeBeauvoir. On that day she happily issued them a Declaration of
Domestic Partnership in Travis County. Johnson and Dollar were the
first male couple registered as Domestic Partners in the state of
Texas. (Though benefits to County employees registered as domestic
partners were later denied in an anti-gay referendum, thus undermining
the purpose of the registry, the registration itself was not revoked.)

On February 21, 2018, Johnson and
Dollar again appeared at the County
Clerk’s office. This time they were issued a Marriage License, which
was signed by Ms. DeBeauvior herself, in recognition of the long
history.

And on March 16, 2018, their
34th
anniversary, Johnson and the Dollar
were married in a private ceremony by Travis County Commissioners Court
Presiding Judge Sarah Eckhardt, who was herself also warm and welcoming
and gracious. She particularly emphasized the probate rights that go
with legal marriage.

In a nice bit of historical symbolism, the witness who
signed the
License was Jim Fouratt. In July 1969, Fouratt had been one of the
original organizers of the Gay Liberation Front in the aftermath of the
“Stonewall Rebellion” in Greenwich Village, New York City, which is
considered the birth of the Gay Liberation Movement.

For nostalgia sake, here're a couple of photos we
found that Kip's mother had taken
of us in 1988 or 89. We were dressed up to go to a gay community
fundraiser (notice Toby is wearing a pink triangle). We stopped by his
Mom's house to say hello.

Toby Johnson, PhDis
author of nine books: three non-fiction books that apply the wisdom of
his
teacher and "wise old man," Joseph Campbell to modern-day social and
religious problems, four gay genre novels that dramatize spiritual
issues at the heart of gay identity, and two books on gay men's
spiritualities and the mystical experience of homosexuality and editor
of a collection of "myths" of gay men's consciousness.

Johnson's book
GAY
SPIRITUALITY: The Role of Gay Identity in the Transformation of
Human Consciousness won a Lambda Literary Award in 2000.

His GAY
PERSPECTIVE: Things Our [Homo]sexuality Tells Us about the Nature
of God and the Universe was nominated for a Lammy in 2003. They
remain
in
print.

FINDING
YOUR OWN TRUE MYTH: What I Learned from Joseph Campbell: The Myth
of the Great Secret III tells the story of Johnson's learning the
real nature of religion and myth and discovering the spiritual
qualities of gay male consciousness.